Letters

Shelby Tyler Smith always had to have the last word in any conversation that he was involved in. He was a compassionate, caring, loving young man whose whole entire life revolved around serving the Lord.
He touched the lives and hearts of many and we will miss him very much until the day we are reunited with him in the kingdom of heaven. If Shelby could have one conversation with the people that he had never met, I believe with all my heart that it would start with one question, “Have you asked Jesus Christ into your heart?”

Most of the news today is about going over the cliff. If our President and Congress would take a look at where America is at today with God, they would see that we have already fallen over the cliff and hit hard on the bottom.

Thanks to everyone for another great Toys for Tots year. A special thanks to my helper Dean Curtsinger, who made it without any illness this year; Becky Wilson and her crew for getting all the toys given out; Mary Williams and her helpers for their ability to keep the toys sorted; and not the least, all the places that had the toy boxes and kept us informed on toy counts and pickups.

Sending Christmas love in a card — yes, that’s what we sat out to do.
As a family, we sat down and started filling out Christmas cards for children at St. Jude’s hospital fighting cancer. As we sat around one night signing cards, Frank, Billy and Frances pulled my attention toward the schools.
They said their classmates might want to sign some cards, and from there it went.

After the horrible shooting in Newtown, Conn., we must secure our schools. Our society has grown more violent [and we] need to protect our children. Having trained staff in our schools, as done in Israel, is the only way to buy those two or three minutes for extra law enforcement and medical care to arrive.
America has thousands of unemployed veterans that need jobs and have put themselves at risk for this country, they would do so for our children in a heartbeat. Israel had a similar problem, armed teachers who were veterans solved the problem. That should be the goal.

The Taylorsville-Spencer County Fire Protection District takes its responsibility seriously. Our community is protected by dedicated and committed emergency service responders who do their jobs when called upon, even at three o’clock in the morning.

Everyone is getting ready for the Christmas holiday, with people running to and fro, trying to get that special gift before anyone else got it.
But after all of this, people are not happy. This is supposed to be a time to be happy. We need to go back to that night when it was time for Mary to have her baby.
She and Joseph had to stay in the stables for there was no room in the inn. So, when Mary had her baby, she laid him in the manger and named him Jesus.

Christmas is the most wonderful day of the year because it celebrates the birth of our savior Jesus Christ, but some of us think of it as a time to receive gifts.
I’d like to ask you a question: Do you have a home, clothes to wear, food to eat, a job and family and friends who love you? If you can answer with a yes, then you are enjoying the most precious gifts that anyone could ask for, so what else would anyone need if they have all those things?